Justin Morneau was fantastic for the Twins yesterday as he went 2-5 with a homerun and 4 RBI. Morneau's line for the season is .312/21/108/85 and he still has plenty of time to surpass the 25 HR mark. I am a little surprised he's going to hit under 30 HR when you consider how well he has hit the ball this year and how many runs he's driven in. However, for my money, Morneau is one of the most valuable players you can have on a fantasy team. I feel about him the same way I feel about guys like Nick Markakis – if I could draft 10 of them, I would.
A couple of days ago, Karl Ravech stated that Roy Halladay may be the best pitcher on the planet, and although I disagree Halladay is still damn close. He collected his 17th win of the season yesterday against the Yanks, continuing his dominance against NY this season and keeping his 2008 ERA at 2.69. He's been absolutely incredible against some of the best offenses in the league this year, posting 7 wins and a 2.35 ERA in 68.2 collective innings against Boston, LA and New York. His line for the year reads 17-9, 2.69 ERA, and 7.59 K/9 with a 1.04 WHIP. If Halladay played for Boston or LA, he'd be shooting for 25 wins rather than having at outside shot at 20. You have to love guys like him and C.C. Sabathia because the devour innings, keep your ERA ridiculously low and still put up very solid K numbers.
The oft-injured Rocco Baldelli seems to be heating it up from the DH spot recently as he's gone 5-6 with 3 doubles, 3 R and 3 RBI in his last 2 games. It would be premature for me to say you should scoop Baldelli for some offensive help in September considering his injury history, but we all know how talented he is at the dish when healthy. It doesn't look like the Rays are going to tax him physically in the field, so he may be worth a look. I would watch his performance during the next series against New York and then make your decision.
B.J. Upton stole his 40th base of the year yesterday and it's a shame his power is down along with his BA because he'd be one of the most valuable fantasy studs in the game right now if he would have repeated his production in those categories from 2007 to this year. Looking at his peripherals, there truly is no discernible reason for why he's done so poorly in those categories. His BB/K is far better than 2007, his BHIP is barely lower, and the speed is obviously there to beat out those infield hits. However, his IFH% is down 6% and his GB rate is 8% higher. Those are the two stats seemingly responsible for the drop in production in BA and HR but I think we've still seen a lot of positives from him this year. If he can work on his swing in the offseason to make sure he starts producing the power we know he's capable of, he could easily be a 20-40 player in 2009.
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